Hockey and box lacrosse remain the few team sports in which fighting doesn't lead to automatic expulsion. Yet in another sign of evolving attitudes, the Western Hockey League this season has banned staged fights. They are the ones in which players drop their gloves right after face-offs in obvious pre-meditation. Any players involved in such fights will immediately be ejected from the game.
"It's a touchy subject, but there are not a lot of staged fights anymore . . . hardly any," said Victoria Royals forward Tim Traber.
Assistant-captain Traber's value to the Royals is multi-faceted and he has stepped up for his teammates, although he can't strictly be classified as a fighter.
"There are a lot of different opinions about fighting in hockey and there's not a right or a wrong opinion," he added. "My opinion is that fighting is part of the game of hockey."
LET THE GAMES BEGIN: Opening weekend for hockey leagues provides far too small a statistical sampling to ascertain much of anything.
But you've still got to figure Monday-morning practice was a far more pleasant experience for the six teams in the WHL, including the Royals, who debuted 2-0 than it was for the five teams that started 0-2.
Among the latter are the Vancouver Giants, who looked pedestrian in dropping two straight to the Royals as Victoria looked more inventive and forward-thinking in its approach.
The Giants truly established their place in the Lower Mainland marketplace during the absence of the Canucks during the last NHL lockout in 2004-05. It doesn't appear this version of the Giants has the kind of appeal that will turn heads in a large and sophisticated market.
Still, the Giants have the uncompromising master Don Hay on the bench. Some of the most tenacious players in the pro ECHL to come through SaveonFoods Memorial Centre during the Salmon Kings era were Hay's Memorial Cup champion Giants grads such as Garet Hunt, J.D. Watt and Tim Kraus.
If anyone can squeeze the most out of what he's got, it's Hay.
BALANCE BEAM: Nicolas Petan of Portland, a five-foot-nine, 17-year-old waterbug-quick centre out of Delta, is the first WHL player of the week for 2012-13 with four goals, eight points and plus-six rating in three games as the Winter Hawks opened 2-1.
The Royals, meanwhile, haven't overly relied on one skater and used a spray-gun approach to dismiss the Giants with Alex Gogolev recording a goal and four points, Steven Hodges two goals and three points and Brandon Magee and Ben Walker two goals each.
And for a Royals outfit that had six players with minus-30 or worse ratings during last season's defensive debacles, it's refreshing to actually see pluses appear beside names.
THE ZANE ZONE: All those pundits who anointed the Royals the clear winner of the deal that sent forward Zane Jones to the Calgary Hitmen in return for Gogolev, not so quick. Jones, a bit of a curiosity and marketing coup in Cowtown because of his connection to great-uncle and Flames legend Lanny McDonald, answered the pundits with two goals and three points in his first two games for the Hitmen.
RISING SON: Royals head coach Dave Lowry can be excused if there are two WHL game sheets he checks nightly. His son, the talented Swift Current Broncos captain Adam Lowry, is off to a fast start on the season with three goals in two games. But the old man has the early edge in the standings as the Broncos started 1-0-1.
